Little Boots

2017 April 7

by PULP

“She’s just doing a few more interviews and she will be with you in about twenty minutes”, came the reply from Little Boots’ mum as we stood in one of Manchester’s live music haunt where the third date of the second JD Set tour was taking place.

“We’ve had a right palaver looking for the right shoes for Victoria tonight, we brought everything except the right shoes!”

But judging from the way the set just unfolded, it wasn’t the shoes that people were looking at. Dressed in a gold Dress with an unpretentious skirt length, she shone under the neon light like some kind of gold unicorn, eyes closed and beaming out a soft charismatic voice to a fresh crowd of silhouetted smiles, I think I can detect a slight blush.

Engaging in conversation with Victoria Hesketh is like sticking your head in a kaleidoscope. Non-stop, unabashed, pausing, occasionally, for verification or just encouragement. As Little Boots, she self-produces glamorous, but vulnerable pop, that sets her aside from contemporaries like Ladyhawk and in a sense MIA, and leans more toward Alison Goldfrapp, and low-fi Crystal Castles, Songs like, ‘Stuck On Repeat’ rolls in like a steam train from the silver screen, while ‘Meddle’ is even busier – and supremely confident. You’d be forgiven for thinking it was Kylie Minogue in the driving seat.

But scroll around her YouTube videos and you find bare bones, alone in her room with a piano, a web-cam and lo-fi covers of Wiley’s ‘Wearin’ My Rolex’. I ask where Victoria ends and Little Boots begins and where she feels most comfortable, at home, or doused in shimmer and synthesizers.

“It’s really murky territory. I do acoustic gigs and it confuses people, but the songs should stand up – they start like that anyway…production is just as creative as writing.”

So the name ‘Little Boots’?

“Little Boots was what my friend had started calling me after watching a film called Caligula… Caligula is Latin for ‘little boots’ which was the name of a Roman Emperor who was pretty insane… he turned the palace into a brothel and made his horse a member of the roman consul, pretty mad.”

You have been doing a lot of D.J set recently, how did you learn in such a short space of time?

“I’ve literally had to learn from doing it on the job. I think it’s weird that people book you because they like your track not based on your D.J skills because six months ago I couldn’t mix and still got loads of bookings. I think it’s all about what you play and not how you make it blend together “.

Blackpool?

“It’s a weird place to grow up. You grow up really cynical and don’t take things at face value. no one even knows what a blog or hype machine is, so it’s a great reality check when Ii go back. I don’t want to make music that’s cool right now and for the intention of people posting them on blogs. I want to make music that people in the local shop will buy. It’s so different from London. It’s definitely very mainstream and soaked in bad dance music on the radio. It sounds ten years old and hasn’t progressed at all. I just think that London can get in this bubble of thought and be super concerned about being in vice magazine and getting on blogs and talking about industry people at your gigs. I don’t give a shit about being cool like that. That whole scene scares me. I’ve just been on such a musical journey my entire life.”

The first single ‘Stuck On Repeat’ is produced by Joe Goddard from Hot Chip right?

“Yeah he just got hold of the original demo I’d done for the track and he was really into it, a lot of the work was done over email. He built a lot of the music up using the original demo then I redid the vocals. It’s a strange way of working but he is very limited with time because of his commitments to Hot Chip’, but it seems to work for us. I like the pressure of working at home rather than in the studio. We’ve got more stuff in the pipeline together so keep an eye out.”

Then Little Boots stood up, shook our hands and left. It would seem that there is no partying tonight for Victoria Hesketh, as the release of Stuck on Repeat nears and her fanbase grows, she will need all the sleep she can get. Little Boots is just getting started.

Go to www.thejdset.co.uk to check out more photos and videos of Little Boots performing at the JD Set, and find out who will grace Night and Day’s stage in May.